UMD Study: Masks Nearly Perfect at Blocking COVID

Researchers Found Even Lower-Performing Masks Were Protective

Any common face mask provides significant protection against the virus that causes COVID-19, but N95 masks are most effective at slashing the amount emitted by infected people, according to a University of Maryland-led study released Wednesday.

So-called “duckbill” N95 masks scored highest in the study, which measured the exhaled breath of participants who were tested both masked and unmasked to measure comparative outputs of SARS-CoV-2. The inexpensive masks, which have two head straps and a horizontal seam, captured 98% of exhaled virus, according to the study published in eBioMedicine.

The researchers also found that—in what might come as a surprise to many—cloth masks outperformed the specific brand of KN95 mask that was tested. Surgical masks brought up the rear in performance out of the four types, but even they blocked 70% of the virus, the tests showed. (To reflect the general public's use of masks, study volunteers were not fit-tested for their masks or trained how to properly wear them.)

“The research shows that any mask is much better than no mask, and an N95 is significantly better than the other options. That’s the No. 1 message,” says the study’s senior author, Donald Milton, a professor of environmental health and a global expert on how viruses spread through the air...

https://today.umd.edu/n95-masks-nearly-perfect-at-blocking-covid-umd-study-shows

Masks Temporarily Required at Silver Spring School Due to COVID Outbreak

Masks are back in one Rosemary Hills Elementary School classroom.

According to a Sept. 5 letter from Principal Rebecca Irwin Kennedy, three or more individuals tested positive for COVID in one classroom during the past 10 days.

Therefore, the school gave out extra KN95 masks and instructed students and staff that they must wear the masks while in school for the next 10 days except while eating and drinking...

Masks Temporarily Required at Silver Spring School Due to COVID Outbreak - Montgomery Community Media (mymcmedia.org)

ACLU of Virginia: We've reached a settlement in our case about peer masking in Virginia public schools affirming that masking is a reasonable modification for students with disabilities that put them at severe risk if they contract COVID.

 In February of last year, 12 parents of students with disabilities filed a lawsuit against Governor Youngkin's Executive Order 2 & Senate Bill 739.

These directives restricted schools from requiring community masking to combat COVID spread & keep kids with disabilities safe. 

In March, a court preliminarily granted these parents the ability to request & receive community masking accommodations.

The parties have reached a settlement that we are waiting for the court to accept that will ensure kids with disabilities can be accommodated at school. 

Under federal disability law, schools MUST make accommodations if a child with a disability requires peer & teacher masking, regardless of the requirements of Executive Order 2 & Senate Bill 739.

Kids with disabilities deserve the same access to education as their peers. 

We are glad to be working with @BrownGoldLevy, @disAbilityLawVA, @arnoldporter, & @WashLaw4CR to move this case forward.

Read more about this lawsuit and its settlement:

Parents and State Settle Lawsuit on School Masking Accommodations for Students with Disabilitieshttps://www.acluva.org/en/press-releases/parents-and-state-settle-lawsuit-school-masking-ac

Thread by @ACLUVA on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App

Masks Cut Covid Spread in Schools, Study Finds

In a so-called natural experiment, two school districts in Boston maintained masking after mandates had been lifted in others, enabling a unique comparison.

Masks have been a cultural flash point since the start of the pandemic, and mask mandates in schools have been especially incendiary. Critics have argued that there is no strong evidence to prove that masks slow the spread of Covid, and that in any case children weren’t wearing the right kinds of masks or weren’t wearing them properly.

Now a research paper details a so-called natural experiment that occurred when all but two school districts in the greater Boston area lifted mask requirements in the spring. Researchers took that opportunity to make a direct comparison of the spread of Covid in masking and non-masking schools.

The bottom line: Masking mandates were linked with significantly reduced numbers of Covid cases in schools.

Infection rates were lower among masked students — even in Boston’s public schools, where many buildings are old and lack good ventilation systems, classrooms are crowded and students are more often from at-risk communities — than among unmasked students attending newer schools in communities like Cambridge and Newton...

Masks Cut Covid Spread in Schools, Study Finds - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

Iowa must permit school districts to require masks in some cases, federal court rules

Iowa school districts must consider medically sensitive students' requests to require mask wearing of those around them, notwithstanding a state law that banned school mask mandates, a federal judge ruled Tuesday.

The decision by Judge Robert Pratt comes in a suit filed by several families challenging Iowa's pandemic-era law, which Gov. Kim Reynolds signed in May 2021, banning school districts and local governments from mandating mask wearing. The plaintiffs are parents of children with chronic health conditions or disabilities rendering them particularly at risk for complications from the coronavirus. They sued, arguing that the state was violating federal disability rights law by denying reasonable accommodations for their children... 

Iowa school mask mandate ban must yield to ADA, federal judge rules (desmoinesregister.com)

COVID-19 Outbreaks Increasing in @mcps Classrooms. COVID Transmission Rate in Montgomery County is SUBSTANTIAL. #COVIDisAirborne

In an October 14, 2022, notice to MCPS families, the MCPS Medical Officer announces that there has been an increase in classroom outbreaks of COVID-19.  

The Medical Officer, Dr. Patricia Kapunan, fails to mention in her announcement that Montgomery County is currently at a rate of SUBSTANTIAL COVID-19 transmission.  

Dr. Kapunan never mentions in her announcement that COVID-19 is transmitted through the air and that ventilation and masks can drastically cut down on transmission.  In fact, Dr. Kapunan never mentions ventilation at all in her announcement.  

Dr. Kapunan also ignores that MCPS supposedly contracted with a company this summer to monitor indoor CO2 levels in all MCPS classrooms.  Was that contract completed? Is the monitoring of CO2 levels in classrooms in place?  

What is the purpose of a MCPS Medical Officer if they are not paying attention to an ongoing pandemic and not pushing the Board of Education to do everything in their power to keep staff and students safe?   

***************************************************

IMPORTANT MESSAGE
FROM THE MCPS SCHOOL SYSTEM
MEDICAL OFFICER

---

Dear MCPS Community,

Last week, we saw an increase in classroom outbreaks of COVID-19. While the overall Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) COVID-19 Community Risk Level is LOW for Montgomery County, we should remain vigilant about preventing the spread of COVID-19, as well as other respiratory viruses, including influenza and RSV. There are a few things we can do to promote health in our school community:

1. Continue basic health hygiene practices. This includes good hand-washing, respiratory hygiene (covering coughs or sneezes), cleaning and disinfection of shared surfaces, and staying home when sick. These actions are more important than ever, going into cold and flu season, and as we spend more time together indoors.
2. Prepare for the upcoming flu season. We are already seeing cases of influenza in the United States. Experts predict more cases of flu compared to last year, when safety measures for COVID-19 that also prevent flu were more common, and because we may have less shared immunity after a couple of lighter flu years. Basic health hygiene practices help prevent flu. The flu vaccine reduces the risk of getting the flu and having severe symptoms from a flu infection. It is available for free for anyone older than 6 months, and is especially important for people at increased risk for flu complications.
3. Continue to help prevent the spread of COVID-19 in our school community.
• Vaccination is still our most effective tool for preventing serious complications, hospitalization or death due to COVID-19. The new COVID-19 boosters are designed to protect against the latest Omicron subvariants and are available at county-sponsored clinics including school-based vaccine clinics, or at retail pharmacies or other locations. As the benefit of vaccines can decrease over time, boosters are especially important for people at increased risk of complications due to COVID-19.
• Staff and students should undergo COVID-19 testing if they develop possible symptoms of COVID-19, or after a suspected or confirmed exposure to a close contact with COVID-19. Please report all positive test results for staff and students by using the MCPS online tool and follow CDC guidelines for isolation and exposure.
• At this time, wearing a mask in MCPS buildings and facilities is optional, unless required by quarantine and isolation guidelines. Temporary masking and testing are used to prevent further spread when outbreaks are identified at school, as an alternative to home quarantine. We continue to consider other options when individuals cannot safely or consistently wear a mask in these situations. Our community also supports all individuals who choose to wear a mask at any risk level for their own health reasons, or to protect another person.

We continue to monitor health data trends closely at the county and district level with our public health partners. Thank you for your help in keeping our MCPS community healthy and ready for in-person learning, and for a wonderful school year together.

Sincerely,

Patricia Kapunan, M.D., MPH
MCPS Medical Officer

American Academy of Pediatrics: As school resumes with changing COVID protocols, here's what parents should know about masking and their children's development: 🧵

As school resumes with changing COVID protocols, here's what parents should know about masking and their children's development: 🧵 

During a child’s first few years, they rapidly develop communications skills. Parents and other caregivers help by reading, talking, singing and playing. The more words a child hears, the better. 

If caregivers are wearing masks, does that harm kids’ language development? No. There is no evidence of this. And we know even visually impaired children develop speech and language at the same rate as their peers. Masks are important to help reduce the spread of COVID-19. During the pandemic, schools with mask policies had less spread of COVID in school. Masks may still be needed to keep kids safe. 

Regardless of mask use, some children will take longer to reach language milestones – and some may need help meeting them. Speech and language delays are common, but highly treatable. If you have concerns, talk with your pediatrician. Remember, babies and toddlers learn the most from their family. Families can help babies’ speech by planning screen-free time at home, including at meals, bath time, and play time. 

Learn more: Do Masks Delay Speech and Language Development? Some families may wonder whether continuous mask use may negatively affect their child's speech and language development. However, there is no evidence that mask use prevents or delays speech and lang… https://www.healthychildren.org/English/health-issues/conditions/COVID-19/Pages/Do-face-masks-interfere-with-language-development.aspx • • •

Thread by @AmerAcadPeds on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App

What Do Masks Do to Kids? Face masks keep kids safe from Covid-19 and keep schools open. There’s no evidence they harm kids developmentally.

...The problem is, so far there is no evidence to support these claims. I talked to several speech therapists, developmental psychologists, and pediatricians, and no one has seen evidence for delayed or changed development in children because of masks. Masks probably aren’t the culprit when it comes to changes in children’s mental health, either. And about two-thirds of Americans support wearing masks, including in schools, according to several polls...

What Do Masks Do to Kids? | The New Republic

How's in-person learning working out for @LASchools without COVID mitigations? Not great!

How's in-person learning working out for @LASchools without COVID mitigations? Not great! In this real school, one sick kid has now passed COVID to 7 other kids and their teacher, with more positives likely. Without any mitigation, more kids will lose instruction. #covidisntover pic.twitter.com/1IByH0FSlW

— LA Parents for COVID-Safe Schools (@LAParents1) August 21, 2022

School districts which removed mask policies had an immediate increase in COVID cases in both students and staff. This increase in cases got bigger over the next 10 weeks.

Dr Ellie Murray, ScD

Follow @EpiEllie

   

1h • 13 tweets • 4 min read

It's almost Back to School time & we're still seeing about 100k cases a day here in the US.

How do we stop COVID from going back to school too?

Our new pre-print confirms face masks must be part of our plan!

Let me explain /🧵

medrxiv.org/cgi/content/sh…

"What did we study?"

Halfway through the 2021/22 school year, some Massachusetts school districts dropped their mask requirements. This created a natural experiment.

We estimated: The causal effect of removing mask mandates in those districts on COVID levels 

"What did we find?"

School districts which removed mask policies had an immediate increase in COVID cases in both students and staff.

This increase in cases got bigger over the next 10 weeks.

"How much did removing mask policies matter?"

Schools which removed mask policies had an average *increase* of 44.9 cases per 1,000 people over a 15 week period compared to if they had not removed their mask polices.

This adds up to an estimated 11,901 *extra* COVID cases! 

Implication: No mask requirement means kids miss school!

We estimated that students had an average increase of 39.9 cases per 1,000.

If all students who tested positive followed state guidelines to isolate for 5+ days, that's almost 20,000 *extra* missed school days! 

Implication: No mask requirement means teachers & school staff miss work!

For all staff, we an estimated 81.7 extra cases per 1,000!!

That's how many *more* teachers & staff got sick with COVID than would have if those school districts had kept mask requirements in place. 

"What about alternate explanations?"

School districts that dropped mask requirements tended to have better budgets, better buildings, better vaccination rates, and lower community COVID levels.

Our study shows those weren't enough to make dropping mask mandates work! 

"Why should you believe our study?"

This study is not a randomized controlled trial, it's an observational study, but it *can* still tell us about cause and effect.

For details on why & how the approach we used works, see this earlier thread:

Unroll available on Thread Reader

https://twitter.com/EpiEllie/status/1555322752810291201?s=20&t=O-aitRhzXHsfCmgU9RTv7w

Bottom line:

Eastern Massachusetts school districts which removed mask requirements in March 2022 saw a *dramatic increase* in COVID cases compared to if those districts had retained mask requirements.

And this was *despite* all other mitigation efforts those districts did. 

A huge thank you to the team at @HealthyBoston who worked so hard on this study, including lead author Dr Tori Cowger & senior author @KTHallPhDMPH, plus the rest of the amazing team: @OjikutuBisola, Sarimer Sanchez, Jaylen Clarke, @DrNataliaLinos, & @DrMaryTBassett. 

Here's a link to the pre-print for those that want to delve more deeply into the science:

Impact of Lifting School Masking Requirements on Incidence of COVID-19 among Staff and Students in Greater-Boston Area School Districts: A Difference-in-Differences AnalysisBackground. In February 2022, following the rescinding of a Massachusetts statewide school masking mandate, only two cities (Boston and neighboring Chelsea) out of 79 school districts in the greater-B…https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.08.09.22278385v1

Adding to say: First author Dr Tori Cowger’s twitter is @ToriCowger (which I probably should have guessed😆🤦🏼‍♀️) 

One last thank you: to #econtwitter who do an excellent job of summarizing & tracking advancements in methods, and helped me stay up to date on new & improved DiD estimators over the past year. 

• • • 

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1557399491438952449.html

Breaking: Prince George’s Co. in Maryland is reinstating its mask requirement Aug. 15. @pgcps is 20th Largest School System in USA

Prince George’s Co. in Maryland is reinstating its mask requirement Aug. 15. They’ll be, currently, the only DC-area county with a mask requirement on the first day of school. In July, the county dropped the requirement for the first time.

— Scott Gelman (@Gelman_Scott) August 12, 2022

🚨POST-COVID & Kids🚨 New @CDCgov report showing quite clearly that children are at significantly more risk for life-threatening diagnoses after COVID infection.

🚨POST-COVID & Kids🚨

New @CDCgov report showing quite clearly that children are at significantly more risk for life-threatening diagnoses after COVID infection. Very convincing evidence that prevention of COVID-19 in children is very important to reduce childhood mortality.

/1 pic.twitter.com/ntNs5CuQ6d

— Tyler Black, MD (@tylerblack32) August 4, 2022

@mcps on July 26, 2022: Wearing a well-fitting mask while indoors in public, including while attending MCPS summer programs

COVID-19 Community Risk Level Now High

On Tuesday, July 26, Montgomery County moved into a  high  COVID-19 community risk level based on COVID-19  Community Level measures  as outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).  Montgomery County Public Schools continues to closely monitor available local data with support from our county and regional public health authorities to inform and enhance community prevention strategies.To reduce the impact of COVID-19 in our schools and community at this elevated risk level, at this time  MCPS strongly recommends:  

• Staying up to date on COVID-19 vaccinations and recommended boosters
• Wearing a well-fitting mask while indoors in public, including while attending MCPS summer programs
• Staying home and testing if symptoms develop 

COVID-19 COMMUNITY
RISK LEVEL CHANGE

Dear MCPS Families,

On Tuesday, July 26, Montgomery County moved into a high COVID-19 community risk level based on COVID-19 Community Level measures as outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). This combined risk metric helps people better understand what is happening in their community by considering community transmission levels and the current impact of COVID-19 on the health care system.   

Montgomery County Public Schools continues to closely monitor available local data with support from our county and regional public health authorities to inform and enhance community prevention strategies.To reduce the impact of COVID-19 in our schools and community at this elevated risk level, at this time MCPS strongly recommends:

• Staying up to date on COVID-19 vaccinations and recommended boosters
• Wearing a well-fitting mask while indoors in public, including while attending MCPS summer programs
• Staying home and testing if symptoms develop 

Community members are encouraged to review the CDC’s recommended prevention strategies to decrease individual and household-level risk from infection when the COVID-19 community level is high. Individuals at higher risk for severe disease, including older adults, individuals who are pregnant or with certain medical conditions, and individuals not vaccinated against COVID-19 may wish to consult a healthcare provider.   

Masks and at-home tests are available at all MCPS summer program locations and local libraries. Age-eligible children may receive the COVID-19 vaccine at school-based vaccine clinics regardless of enrollment. Additional information on testing and vaccination clinic opportunities in the community are available from the Montgomery County Department of Health and Human Services. 

Staff and students participating in MCPS on-site summer programs should report positive test results on the MCPS COVID-19 Reporting Form. Other community members who test positive for COVID should report test results to the Maryland Department of Health OneStop Portal. 

Montgomery County Public Schools

Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) (montgomeryschoolsmd.org)

 

MCPS Required Masks at July 30th Job Fair

 

mcps_md

Learn about available jobs at MCPS at a job fair being held from 10 a.m. to noon on Saturday, July 30 at @montgomerycollege's Rockville campus. Go to www.mcpscareers.org to see open positions.

6d

https://www.instagram.com/p/CgmdZIOMmw-/

@montgomerycoll invites you to join us today for the Elementary and Early Childhood Education Job Fair at the Rockville Campus from 10-12! The Job Fair is OPEN to COMMUNITY! @MCPS @MCEngage @MCEarlyEd @MCEdRising @TeacherEdMC pic.twitter.com/AF4G1qyVJk

— Dr. S Pruneda-Hernandez (@sprunedah) July 30, 2022

Here's a thread with many places that are mandating masks! Please let us know if you hear of other places!

 https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1550719279112355840.html

Masks are now required indoors at San Diego Unified School District schools, offices

 

Indoor mask mandates returned Monday for the San Diego Unified School District schools and offices as COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations tick up in the county.

Mandatory masking in indoor public spaces will be required for all students, teachers and staff at least through the end of summer school...

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/masks-now-required-indoors-san-diego-unified-school/story?id=87008125

Don't breathe it in. #COVIDisAirborne

Don't breathe it in. #COVIDisAirborne pic.twitter.com/czmr4ki2dC

— The John Snow Project (@JohnSnowProject) July 10, 2022

COVID Cases Are Surging In Montgomery County Schools

COVID cases in Montgomery County Public Schools are spiking, reaching their highest levels since the January omicron wave.

More than 2,910 cases have been reported amongst students and staff in the past 10 days, according to MCPS data. So far in May, 12,027 students have quarantined — the second-highest number of quarantined students recorded this academic year, behind the January total of 15,191.

The surge has prompted one school, Sherwood Elementary School, to reinstate its mask requirement after more than 63 students and staff tested positive in recent days — making up over 11% of the school’s population. It’s the highest percentage of COVID cases of any school in the system. MCPS had lifted its mask mandate back in March.

According to the Bethesda Beat, MCPS alerted parents and families last week that classrooms with three or more positive cases in the past 10 days may be asked to resume masking...

https://dcist.com/story/22/05/18/montgomery-county-schools-covid-spike/